In the Dark of the Morning
by The Hourglass Mage
Summary: I have returned with rabid FrolloxEsmeralda fanfiction! I felt I kind of owed it to all my wonderful readers to have a scene where Esmeralda actually accepted Frollo... so, here it is, my attempt at a touching romantic scene! I hope you enjoy it. ;


Dawn was a mere few hours away. The very sunrise that would determine the fate of his eternal soul was fast approaching, and Claude Frollo had not moved from his knees. His legs had long gone numb from lack of blood flow, and the heat from the blazing fireplace causing him to perspire. But he did not move. He didn't even look up, though the back of his neck and his shoulders felt like they were on fire.

"Lord," he croaked, his throat dry as a desert and his voice cracked, he entreated. "Take this affliction from me! Once more, I beg of you... " he drew a deep, shuddering breath through his teeth. He almost sobbed, but he had no more tears to shed, though his eyes were red-rimmed and stung. "If it be your will that I go with this gypsy heathen, this witch, this siren! If it be your will that I go with her and break my vow to you, and shatter the holy bond that is forged between my soul and your blood … if it be your will, do not let her spurn me for the pyre. I do not think…" his voice trailed off. Not even to God could he voice his worst fears. He wanted to say, more than anything in the world, _'Do not let them burn her, I don't think that I could bear it.' _

God did not answer him. God had not deigned to answer him for many sleepless nights now. This temptress, who had been sent by the devil to lure him through the gates of hell, had fought a battle for his soul and won. Claude would gladly give her his soul, his entire being, if only to be with her. If only to kiss her delicate sun-kissed foot, if only to hold that foot in his hand, the foot that had been so horribly tortured just a day earlier, and worship it as the Virgin herself. If only he could run his hand up that shapely leg, and feel her smooth thigh-! Oh, such unholy thoughts to torture a ruined man! He was damned to hell, he knew that much. But such a hell that it would be, if she were there by his side! An eternity with Beezlebub was nothing, a pittance, compared to one treasured second on earth in her arms, kissing her ripe lips, holding her close. He wanted nothing more, he begged for nothing more, and still it had not been granted. In his hands, he clenched a pardon. A pardon written in ink and signed in blood. His heart's blood. He would give it to her. He would gladly rip his heart from his chest and lie it at her feet if he knew it would give her one moment's fleeting pleasure. Esmeralda, _his _La Esmeralda! Devil or witch she may be, he cared not. To him, she was a saint, more worthy than any other to be so.

He knew what he was going to do. He knew what he _had_ to do. He had to go to her, before the dawn arrived and brought with it the executioner who would lash her to a pyre and send her back to hell from whence she came. Even if she spurned him, he had to know that he tried. If all else failed, he could come crawling back to God, who would accept the wretched remnants of his soul, if he was fortunate.

Standing, sapping nearly all the strength left in his body, Claude Frollo clutched the pardon to his breast and prayed to God that Esmeralda didn't say 'no'. He placed his free hand against he wall and descended the stairs, slowly. Such a mundane motion seemed to take hours! He wondered how much longer he had before daybreak. One hour, two? Or not even that long? He reached the bottom of the stairs, and took off as a man possessed in the direction of the dungeon. Were anyone to see the blaze in his eyes and at the pace he was running they would have thought him mad.

He approached the dungeon entrance and forced himself to slow down. He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply to regain his composure. Smoothing his iron gray hair away from his face, Frollo forced an impenetrable look and took a bold step forward towards the dungeon entrance, tucking the pardon into the sleeve of his cassock.

The jail keeper lumbered into the doorway, half-walking, half-dragging his left leg across the floor. The man had obviously been drinking, since he had a nearly empty bottle of sloshing brown liquid in one hand. The jailer looked up and, as if for the first time, noticed that the judge was there. He granted Claude Frollo a dirty leer and raised his bottle, as if in a toast.

"May I –" he paused to belch. "Be of any ass'stnce, your – grace?"

Claude Frollo did his best to keep his expression free of blatant contempt, and addressed the jailer as cordially as he knew how.

"Yes, I have come for the gypsy Esmeralda." Claude Frollo said with a righteous lift of his chin, with what he hoped was an authoritative manner.

"Ah, I see." The jailer chortled lewdly, and lumbered forward a bit further. "Come ta see the gypsy witch," he laughed, talking in a drunken sing-song manner. "Come ta 'convert' her, my lord?"

Claude Frollo raised his hand as if to bring it down across the man's face. The jailer cowered, and when the judge did not move to make the strike, he scampered out of the way and went as quickly down the hall as his bad leg allowed. Claude Frollo followed him at a statelier pace.

The jailer grabbed a ring of keys from his belt. Muttering, he went through them, one by one, and finally produced the right one. Plunging it into the great lock, he twisted it, and with a harsh grating sound the bolt was released and the door opened. The jailer put his hand against the rough wood and patted it, daring to meet the judge's eyes once more.

"She – erm – went quiet about an hour ago, my lord. Before that, she was beating on the door. I don't know if you like 'em at all feisty, but-"

"Get out, leech," Claude Frollo hissed. "Breathe another word, and I will see it is your last."

The jailer gulped, bowed hastily, and was gone with a speed that defied the laws of sound.

Claude Frollo grasped the cross that hung around his neck and stepped into the jail cell, pulling the door shut behind him. The cell was miniscule, and not clean by even the rat's standards. A strong odor arose from the musty straw that was scattered over the stone floor, and the only light was from the waning moonbeams that leaked in through an arrow slit window.

Claude Frollo paused, leaning against the wood of the door, waiting. He could barely see in the light provided, and vaguely wondered why he hadn't thought to bring a candle. The gypsy girl's form was almost indistinguishable. _'Best to let her show herself,'_ he thought.

A hand clamped around his throat, sharp fingernails digging into his skin like tiny daggers. Claude Frollo felt himself being dragged forward and thrown back up against the wall where his head struck the wood. Annoyed and slightly disoriented, he brought up hands to clamp around delicate, warm wrists. A pair of blue-green eyes glowered at him from behind a curtain of black lace eyelashes. He dared to breathe.

"What are _you_ doing here?" the gypsy heathen demanded of him. Her breath was warm against his skin. Her lips were so close to his that he could almost taste them.

"I came to speak to you," he said, forcing himself to be calm and dignified. "A task which you are making quite difficult, at the moment."

"I can make it impossible," Esmeralda hissed, applying more pressure to his throat. "Are you certain it is only 'talking' that you had on your mind_, mon juge de seigneur?" _she spit in his face and released her hold. He swayed forward, but didn't drop. His hands went to his throat, and he glowered at her in turn.

"Will you let me say my peace? Or will you spurn me before I even begin?"

Esmeralda threw her hands in the air, as if entreating heaven. "Will you leave me in peace? Was the boot that they put around my ankle not torture enough? Do you desire to see me suffer further?"

"No!" he had never been more passionate about anything in his life. "No, I have no desire to see you suffer at all!"

"Then why am I here, judge? Why am I languishing in a dungeon cell when I want to be out with my people, dancing in the streets? The sun! I want to see the sun-" he couldn't see the tears rising to her eyes, but he could hear them choking off her words. It made him want to draw her into his arms and shower her with a thousand kisses. "I just want to see the sun, to feel the sun. You don't know what it is like to be a prisoner behind stone walls, when you have seen so much of the world!"

"Prisoner, my lady? You don't think that I know what it is like to be prisoner? I have been one for far longer than you! I have been a prisoner in my own manner, chained to my vows like a slave. Yet a slave, in his own way, still has a modicum of free will. To be a prisoner, to have no will of your own, to bend only to the will of your captor- that is what I am, I am a prisoner to you! I am entrapped in your gaze, it is your eyes that haunt my dreams at night. I submit to your every word! Do you say steal? I will steal. Do you say die? I will die. I would do anything for you. I would stop breathing this very second if I knew it would give you pleasure. Do you not see, woman? I love you!"

He hadn't realized that his voice had continued to climb throughout the tirade, and that he was screaming by the time the final words escaped his lips. It echoed off the walls, and eventually died in the chilled silence that was to follow.

He could feel the gypsy's eyes boring into him, searching his soul. He wanted her to have it. He wanted to give his heart, his soul, his body to her. She could have it, all of it. It was his no longer. It was refuse; it was trash, nothing to him!

"You don't speak," he said, after enough silence had passed and nothing had been said. "Please, speak to me. If only to say that you do not desire me, as I do you. But I – I must know. Here…" he fumbled with his sleeves, like a blind man searching madly. He finally pulled out the pardon and unfurled it, with shaking hands. "I have this, a pardon. It can save you. You needn't burn tomorrow." His eyes came up and for a moment, in the darkness, their gazes locked together. "I can't go on without you. It is impossible. I only want to see you live. If you die tomorrow, I will watch and wait for your last breath to pass through your perfect lips. And then I will die. I will plunge a dagger through my heart, the heart that is rightfully yours. I will give my soul up to God and he will do with it what he wills. I care not where I go, so long as I know you will be there to greet me." He groped in the darkness for her hand, and finding it; he dragged her forward, and pressed the document into her hands. "Take it," he whispered, pressing his lips close to her ear. "Let me save you. Please." She tried to pull away, but he kept his iron grip on her wrist. "Don't tell me that you don't love me – I know that you don't love me. But, please, say only that … you will try." He gripped her wrist even tighter, and she gasped. "Try to love me. You can do that, can't you? I am a miserable man. A very, very miserable man." He sank to his knees, and pressed his lips to the back of her hand. Her skin was so soft beneath his lips, he wanted to weep. "If you just can't love me, if you try and you just cannot bring yourself to do it, then you may go. I will never approach you again, you will not see nor hear from me. But for the love of God, do not refuse me and allow me to watch you die!" he showered her hand in kisses, kissing her delicate fingertips and her wrist.

There was more silence, Esmeralda said not a word.

Then Claude Frollo felt a delicate hand brush his cheek. He looked up, and felt rather than saw the gypsy girl kneeling before him, so close that he could have taken her into his arms and pressed her close. So close. How he longed to be so close to her!

She opened her mouth, her sweet lips parting to speak, and she ran her tongue over them, as if unsure what to say.

At last, she spoke, and he hung on her every word. "I cannot promise anything," she spoke softly, her hand still lingering on his cheek. "I _won't_ promise anything, but…" here, he voice choked again, as if tears were forthcoming. "Save me. Save me from death, from the pyre, and I will try to love you, Frollo."

His heart leapt in his chest. His breath caught in his throat, and he didn't care. He need never have breathed again. She was going to try!

Without even thinking, he grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her forward, kissing her lips, savoring her mouth and what it felt like just to hold her. His hands eased down her arms around wrapped around her waist as he pulled her close. Pressing her to him as a lover might.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you," he whispered to her, trying not to betray the tears that were brimming at his eyes.

She returned the embrace, and her lips yielded to his kisses.

The golden rays of dawn spilled through the tiny window, heralding not a death, but a union.


End file.
